2. Stages of development. The main problems and schools of ancient philosophy.

Stages of development.

Many prominent philosophers write about the periodization of ancient philosophy, this is Chanyshev A.N. (A course of lectures on ancient philosophy, M., 1981), Smirnov I.N., Titov V.F. (“Philosophy”, M., 1996), Asmus V.F. (History of ancient philosophy M., 1965), Bogomolov A.S. (“Ancient Philosophy”, Moscow State University, 1985). For the convenience of analysis, it is necessary to involve a more concise periodization, presented by Smirnov I.N. Thus, he notes that when analyzing Greek philosophy, three periods are distinguished in it: the first - from Thales to Aristotle, the second - Greek philosophy in the Roman world, and, finally, the third - Neoplatonic philosophy.

The history of Greek philosophy is a general and at the same time a living individual image of spiritual development in general. The first period can be called cosmological, ethical-political and ethical-religious-philosophical according to the interests prevailing in it. Absolutely all scientists-philosophers note that this period of development of ancient philosophy was the period of natural philosophy. A peculiar feature of ancient philosophy was the connection of its teachings with the teachings about nature, from which independent sciences later developed: astronomy, physics, biology. In the VI and V centuries. BC. philosophy did not yet exist separately from the knowledge of nature, and knowledge about nature did not exist separately from philosophy. Cosmological speculation of the 7th and 6th centuries BC raises the question of the ultimate foundation of things. Thus, the concept of world unity appears, which opposes a multitude of phenomena and through which they try to explain the connection between this multitude and diversity, as well as a pattern that manifests itself primarily in the most general space processes, in the change of day and night, in the movement of the stars. simplest form there is the concept of a single universal substance, from which things originate in perpetual motion and into which they again turn.

The second period of Greek philosophy (V-VI centuries BC) begins with the formulation of anthropological problems. Naturphilosophical thinking reached limits beyond which it could not go at that time. This period is represented by the Sophists, Socrates and Socrates. In his philosophical activity, Socrates was guided by two principles formulated by the oracles: "the need for everyone to know himself and the fact that no person knows anything for sure and only a true sage knows that he knows nothing." Socrates ends the natural philosophical period in the history of ancient Greek philosophy and begins a new stage associated with the activities of Plato and Aristotle. Plato goes far beyond the boundaries of the Socratic spirit. Plato is a conscious and consistent objective idealist. He was the first among philosophers to pose the fundamental question of philosophy, the question of the relationship between spirit and matter. Strictly speaking, it is possible to speak about philosophy in ancient Greece with a significant degree of certainty only starting from Plato.

The third period of ancient philosophy is the age of Hellenism. These include the Stoics, the Epicureans, the Skeptics. It includes the period of early Hellenism (III-I centuries BC) and the period of late Hellenism (I-V centuries AD). The culture of early Hellenism was characterized primarily by individualism, due to the liberation of the human person from political, economic and moral dependence on the policy. The subjective world of the individual becomes the main subject of philosophical research. During the period of late Hellenism, the main trends in the development of ancient philosophical thought were brought to their logical conclusion. There was a kind of return to the ideas of the classics, to its philosophical teachings about being (neopythagoreanism, neoplatonism), but a return enriched with knowledge of the subjective world of the individual. Interaction with Eastern cultures within the framework of a single Roman Empire led philosophical thought to a partial departure from rationalism and an appeal to mysticism. The philosophy of late Hellenism, freeing itself from the free-thinking of early Hellenism, took the path of sacred, that is, religious comprehension of the world.

Problems of ancient philosophy.

The cumulative problems of ancient philosophy can be thematically defined as follows: cosmology (natural philosophers), in its context, the totality of the real was seen as “physis” (nature) and as cosmos (order), the main question is: “How did the cosmos arise?”; morality (sophists) was a defining theme in the knowledge of man and his specific abilities; metaphysics (Plato) declares the existence of an intelligible reality, claims that reality and being are heterogeneous, and the world of ideas is higher than the sensual; methodology (Plato, Aristotle) ​​develops the problems of the genesis and nature of knowledge, while the method of rational search is understood as an expression of the rules of adequate thinking; aesthetics is developed as a sphere for solving the problem of art and beauty in itself; the problems of proto-Aristotelian philosophy can be grouped as a hierarchy of generalizing problems: physics (ontology-theology-physics-cosmology), logic (epistemology), ethics; and at the end of the era of ancient philosophy, mystical-religious problems are formed, they are characteristic of the Christian period of Greek philosophy.

It should be noted that in line with the ancient ability to perceive this world, philosophically theoretical philosophical thought seems to be the most important for the subsequent formation philosophical knowledge. At the very least, the doctrine of philosophy as life has now undergone a significant change: philosophy is no longer just life, but life precisely in cognition. Of course, the elements of practical philosophy that develop the ideas of ancient practical philosophy retain their significance: the ideas of ethics, politics, rhetoric, the theory of state and law. Thus, it is theory that can be considered the philosophical discovery of antiquity, which determined not only the thinking of modern man, but also his life. And without a doubt, the "reverse influence" of the mechanisms of cognition generated by the ancient Greek consciousness had a very strong effect on the very structure of a person's conscious life. In this sense, if the theory as a principle of organization of knowledge and its results is fully verified, then its "reverse" effect as a reverse principle of organization of consciousness is not yet completely clear.

Schools of ancient philosophy.

According to the estimates of Roman historians, in ancient Greece there were 288 philosophical teachings, of which, in addition to the great philosophical schools, the teachings of the Cynics and Cyrenian philosophers stand out. There were four great schools in Athens: Plato's Academy, Aristotle's Lyceum, Portico (Stoic school) and Garden (Epicurean school).

The Ionian (or Milesian, according to the place of origin) school is the oldest school of natural philosophy. According to A.N. Chanyshev, “Ionian philosophy is proto-philosophy. It is also characterized by the absence of polarization into materialism and idealism ..., the presence of many images of mythology, significant elements of anthropomorphism, pantheism, the absence of proper philosophical terminology, the presentation of physical processes in the context of moral issues. But Ionian philosophy is already philosophy in the basic sense of the word, because already its first creators - Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes - sought to understand this or that principle as a substance (water, air, fire, etc.). Their origin is always the same (in this sense, the Ionian philosophers are monists), it is material, but also reasonable, even divine. Each of the philosophers defined one of the elements as this beginning. Thales is the founder of the Milesian or Ionian school, the first philosophical school. He was one of the founders of philosophy and mathematics, he was the first to formulate geometric theorems, he studied astronomy and geometry from the Egyptian priests. Thales became the founder of natural philosophy and formulated its two main problems: the beginning and the universal. He believed that the beginning was water, in which the earth rests, and he considered the world filled with gods, animated. Thales also divided the year into 365 days. Heraclitus said that everything is born from fire by rarefaction and condensation, and burns out after certain periods. Fire symbolizes the struggle of opposites in space and its constant movement. Heraclitus also introduced the concept of the Logos (Word) - the principle of reasonable unity, which orders the world from opposite principles. The Logos governs the world, and the world can only be known through it. Anaximander (610 - c. 540 BC) considered the beginning of everything to be infinite nature - something in between the four elements. He said that the emergence and destruction of worlds is an eternal cyclical process. Anaximenes (d. 525 BC), a student of Anaximander, considered air to be the beginning. Rarefied, the air becomes fire, thickening - wind, water and earth. Anaxagoras, a student of Anaximenes, introduced the concept of Nus (Mind), organizing the cosmos from a mixture of disorderly elements. The origin of the foundations of astronomy, mathematics, geography, physics, biology, and other sciences is associated with the Ionian school.

Independently of these ancient Ionians of Asia Minor, in the Lower Italic colonies of the Greeks, there appear thinkers imbued with the same idea of ​​world unity. These include, first of all, Pythagoras and his students, who explored the world whole. They noticed first of all the regularity in the movement of celestial bodies and from them tried to transfer this regularity to earthly phenomena, the phenomena of the physical and moral worlds. The Pythagorean school was founded by Pythagoras in Croton (Southern Italy) and lasted until the beginning of the 4th century. BC, although the persecution of her began almost immediately after the death of Pythagoras in 500 BC. In fact, it was a religious and philosophical aristocratic brotherhood, it had big influence to the Greek cities of southern Italy and Sicily. The union was distinguished by strict customs and high morality. However, both appearance and behavior were only a consequence of the views of philosophers on the human soul and its immortality, which implied a certain upbringing in this, earthly life. The Pythagorean school laid the foundation for the mathematical sciences. Numbers were understood as the essence of everything that exists, they were given a mystical meaning. The basis of Pythagorean mathematics is the doctrine of the decade: 1+2+3+4=10. These four numbers describe all the processes taking place in the world. The world order was presented to them in the form of domination of numbers; and in this sense they transfer to the world, "as a whole, the concept of cosmos, which originally meant order, decoration." If you ask yourself the question of “the philosophical orientation of Pythagoras, then it seems that we can say with full confidence that it was, first of all, the philosophy of number, in this it differed sharply from the Ionian natural philosophy, which sought to reduce everything that exists to one or another material element, emphasizing its qualitative originality. (water, air, fire, earth).

The Pythagoreans own the doctrine of the music of the spheres and the musical scale, reflecting harmony solar system, where each planet corresponds to a certain note, and together they create intervals of the musical scale. They also laid the foundation for musical psychology: music was used as a means of education and healing of the soul and body. Astronomy and medicine began to develop in the Pythagorean school. She created many allegorical commentaries on Homer, as well as a grammar Greek. Thus, the Pythagoreans can be considered the founders of the humanities, natural, exact and systematic sciences.

The Eleatic school is an ancient Greek philosophical school whose teachings developed from the end of the 6th century BC. until the beginning of the second half of the 5th c. BC. with the crown of major philosophers - Parmenides, Zeno and Melissus. The first two - Parmenides and Zeno - lived in the small Italian city of Elea, and the third - Melissus - was a native of Samos, far from Elea. But since the main teachings of the school were developed by Parmenides and Zeno, citizens from the city of Elea, the school as a whole was called Elea. And if the Pythagoreans considered the world order exclusively from its quantitative side, then in the 6th century they are opposed by directions that, like the ancient Ionian thinkers, understand the idea of ​​world unity qualitatively, however, they see the world unity not in a single world substance, but in a single ruling world principle, in a single concept that dominates the change of all phenomena. For the Eleatics, such a concept is being, which remains constant with every change in things.

The emergence of the school of sophists was a response to the need of democracy in education and sciences. Wandering teachers for money could teach anyone the art of speech. Their main goal was to prepare young people for an active political life. The activity of the sophists, which relativized any truth, laid the foundation for the search for new forms of the reliability of knowledge - those that could stand before the court of critical reflection. This search was continued by the great Athenian philosopher Socrates (c. 470 - 399 BC), first a student of the sophists, and then their critic. The difference between Socrates and the sophists is that the criterion for evaluating actions for him is the consideration of what motives determine the decision, what is useful and what is harmful. Socrates' thoughts served as the basis for the development of most of the subsequent philosophical schools that his students founded, including Plato's Academy. essence own philosophy he explained in one sentence: "I know only one thing, that I know nothing." In his conversations, Socrates does not answer questions, he poses them, artfully prompting the interlocutor to an independent search for truth. And when he, it would seem, is close to her, he finds new arguments and arguments to show the futility of these attempts. The main philosophical interest of Socrates focuses on the question of what is a person, what is human consciousness. "Know thyself" is Socrates' favorite saying.

Plato combined in his teaching the values ​​of his two great predecessors: Pythagoras and Socrates. From the Pythagoreans, he took the art of mathematics and the idea of ​​​​creating a philosophical school, which he embodied in his Academy in Athens. Plato's students were mostly "sleek young gentlemen" from aristocratic families (one can recall at least his most famous student, Aristotle). For classes, the Academy was built in a picturesque corner on the northwestern outskirts of the city. The famous philosophical school lasted until the very end of antiquity, until 529, when the Byzantine emperor Justinian closed it. Although Plato, like Socrates, believed that charging for wisdom was no better than charging for love, and, like him, called the sophists "prostitutes from philosophy" for demanding money from students, this did not prevent Plato to accept rich gifts and all kinds of help from the powers that be. From Socrates, Plato learned doubt, irony, and the art of conversation. Plato's dialogues arouse interest and teach reflection on the very serious problems of life, which have not changed much in two and a half thousand years. The most significant in Plato's philosophy are ideas about Ideas, Justice and the State. He tried to combine the philosophical and the political. He prepared in his school philosopher-rulers capable of ruling justly, based on the principles of the common good.

In 335 BC Aristotle, a student of Plato, founded his own school - the Lyceum, or Peripate, which was distinguished exclusively by a philosophical orientation. However, the harmonious system of Aristotle is difficult to synthesize from his works, which are often collections of lectures and courses. One of the most important results of Aristotle's activity in politics was the education of Alexander the Great. Hellenistic states and new philosophers arose on the ruins of the Great Empire.

If the former ethical teachings saw the main means of the moral improvement of the individual in his inclusion in the social whole, now, on the contrary, philosophers consider it a condition for the virtuous and happy life the liberation of man from the power of the outside world, and above all from the political and social sphere. This is largely the attitude of the Stoic school. This school, founded by Zeno at the end of the 4th century. BC, existed during the time of the Roman Empire. Philosophy for the Stoics is not just a science, but above all a life path, life wisdom. Only philosophy can teach a person to maintain self-control and dignity in difficult situation, which developed in the era of Hellenism, especially in the late Roman Empire, where the decay of morals in the first centuries of the new era reached its highest point. The Stoics consider freedom from the power of the outside world over a person to be the main virtue of a sage; its strength lies in the fact that it is not a slave of its own passions. A real sage, according to the Stoics, is not even afraid of death; It is from the Stoics that the understanding of philosophy as the science of dying comes. The main idea of ​​Stoicism is obedience to fate and the fatality of all things. Zeno said this about the Stoic: "To live consistently, that is, in accordance with a single and harmonious rule of life, for those who live inconsistently are unhappy." Nature for a Stoic is fate or fate: make peace with fate, do not resist it - this is one of the commandments of Seneca.

A complete rejection of social activism in ethics is found in the famous materialist Epicurus (341-270 BC). The most famous of the Roman Epicureans was Lucretius Carus (c. 99 - 55 AD). The individual, and not the social whole, is the starting point of Epicurean ethics. Thus, Epicurus revises the definition of man given by Aristotle. The individual is primary; all social ties, all human relations depend on individuals, on their subjective desires and rational considerations of utility and pleasure. Social union, according to Epicurus, is not the highest goal, but only a means for the personal well-being of individuals; on this point Epicurus is close to the sophists. In 306 BC in Athens he founded a school. In contrast to the Stoic, Epicurean ethics is hedonistic: Epicurus considered the goal of human life to be happiness, understood as pleasure. However, Epicurus saw true pleasure not at all in indulging in gross sensual pleasures without any measure. Like most of the Greek sages, he was committed to the ideal of proportion. As with the Stoics, it was considered the highest pleasure, equanimity of spirit (ataraxia), peace of mind and serenity, and such a state can be achieved only if a person learns to moderate his passions and carnal desires, subordinating them to reason. The Epicureans pay particular attention to the fight against superstitions, including the traditional Greek religion.

Turn to mysticism. The philosophy of late Hellenism, freeing itself from the free-thinking of early Hellenism, took the path of the sacred, i.e. religious understanding of the world. FEATURES OF ANTIQUE PHILOSOPHY 1. Genesis of philosophy: the transition from myth to logos The transition from a socially homogeneous tribal society to a socially differentiated society led to a change in ways of thinking. ...

In decomposition, the real element of being. And this is a brilliant take-off of thought to a fundamentally new level of philosophical comprehension of existence. Chapter 3. The emergence and features of sophistry 3.1 Sophistry and the philosophy of the sophists In the 5th century. BC e. in many cities of Greece to replace political power the old aristocracy and tyranny came to the power of slave-owning democracy. Development of the created...

Topic: The problem of the beginning in ancient philosophy

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University: VZFEI

Year and city: Yaroslavl 2011

Table of contents
Introduction 3
The problem of the beginning among representatives of materialism 4
in antiquity. four
Ancient schools of philosophy 5
(materialistic line) 5
The problem of the beginning among the representatives of idealism in antiquity 8
Ancient schools of philosophy 9
(idealistic line) 9
The doctrine of the beginning in the philosophy of ancient atomists. The significance of this doctrine in the history of the development of philosophy and science. fifteen
Conclusion 18
Sources 20

Introduction

ancient philosophy- a set of philosophical teachings that arose in ancient Greece and Rome in the period from the 6th century BC. by 6th c. AD The conditional time limits of this period are considered to be 585 BC. (when the Greek scientist Thales predicted solar eclipse) and 529 AD. (when the Neoplatonic school in Athens was closed by Emperor Justinian). The main language of ancient philosophy was ancient Greek, from the 2nd-1st centuries. began the development of philosophical literature also in Latin.

Ancient philosophy arose and developed during the birth and formation of a slave-owning society, when it was divided into classes and isolated social group people who dealt only mental labor. This philosophy owes its appearance to the development of natural science, especially mathematics and astronomy. In it, as in any other, including modern philosophy, there were two directly opposite directions: materialism (the line of Democritus) and idealism (the line of Plato).

The subject of philosophy - both ancient and modern - being, reality as a whole. In fact, she asks a question addressed to reality as a whole: what is the beginning of all things? It is this question, the doctrine of the origin of being, that I want to consider in my work.

The problem of the beginning among the representatives of materialism in antiquity.

Materialism (from Latin materialis - material) - a philosophical worldview, according to which matter (objective reality) is ontologically primary (cause, condition, limitation), and the ideal (concepts, will, spirit, etc.) is secondary (result, consequence). Materialism recognizes the existence of a single substance - matter; all entities are formed by matter, and phenomena (including consciousness) are processes of interaction of material entities.

Materialism - one of the two main philosophical directions, which solves the main question of philosophy in favor of the primacy of matter, nature, being, physical, objective and considers consciousness, thinking as a property of matter, as opposed to idealism, which takes spirit, idea, consciousness, thinking, mentality as the initial one, subjective.

The recognition of the primacy of matter means that it was not created by anyone, but exists forever, that space and time are objectively existing forms of the existence of matter, that thinking is inseparable from matter, which thinks that the unity of the world consists in its materiality.

The development of materialism can be traced throughout the history of Western thought from its very beginning and found throughout the history of philosophy. A common feature of ancient philosophy (to a greater extent of its early stage) is cosmocentrism. This means that the center of philosophical thinking is the cosmos. The introduction of the concept of "cosmos" into the philosophical lexicon is attributed to the Milesian thinkers and Pythagoras. With this concept, the Greeks denoted an ordered, organized being, as opposed to chaos as a disordered and disorganized state.

Ancient schools of philosophy (materialistic line)

1. Milesian School of Philosophy

The first philosophical school arose in the city of Miletus.

Its representatives: Thales(the end of the 7th - the first half of the 6th centuries BC), Anaximander(VI century BC), Anaximenes(VI century BC), Heraclitus from Ephesus (544 or 540-480 BC)

The Milesian school pays special attention to the problems of the origin, the root cause of the world. Initially, they thought of it as something one with nature. Nature itself, and not something unnatural, is considered by them as the cause of everything that exists.

Pointing to the origin meant the transition from mythological thinking to philosophical - highlighting universal. However, at first, the universal was presented not in a conceptual, but in a visual form: Thales assumed that the origin of everything that exists is water. Anaximenes - air, Heraclitus - fire, Anaximander - iperon.

Water for Thales correlated not only with the physical and chemical properties of water, but also with the divine principle. Those. Thales spoke of some divine streams flowing to the earth, to man. God is not born by anyone, he exists forever, and therefore he is the basis of everything.

Anaximenes in his essay “On Nature” writes that the beginning is infinite, and this beginning is air.

"Air is a boundless substance, just like our soul."

Heraclitus emphasizes the importance of fire. Fire is considered the fundamental principle of the world. The world as a whole is seen as a transformation of fire. Heraclitus expressed truly brilliant ideas of the variability of the material world. The variability of the cosmos, its bifurcation, the inconsistency of the world - all this is the beginning of dialectics. Everything, according to the views of Heraclitus, caused is conditioned, subordinated to the logos, i.e. naturally.

The significance of the teachings of Heraclitus on development is exceptional. The statement about the universal fluidity of things, the changeability of phenomena - his great conjecture in dialectical thinking. “Everything moves”, “everything flows”, nothing remains motionless and constant, everything without exception changes and transforms. In two of his well-known fragments we read: "You cannot enter the same river twice and you cannot touch something mortal twice in the same state, but, due to irresistibility and rapid change, everything is scattered and collected, it comes and goes" ; "We enter and we do not enter the same river, we are the same and not the same."

The Milesian philosopher Anaximander proceeded from the fact that the beginning cannot be something material. He defined the beginning as aiperon - limitless, limitless, quantitatively infinite, inexhaustible; iperon embraces anything and everything. Manages and maintains all states. All things are produced and realized with it and in it. This infinite principle also appears as divine.

Combining in the beginning a substantial basis (that which is the cause of the emergence of everything) and a material substrate (that from which all things are made), the first Greek philosophers put an end to the theogonic interpretation of the world, since the myth was replaced by a logos, a reasonable word, a philosophical concept.

The materialists of ancient Greek philosophy argued that the emergence and development of the world around us is a natural, not a supernatural process. At that distant time, they rejected all sorts of mystical approaches to the problem of the origin of the material world. This is their historical merit.

Another outstanding thinker-materialist of ancient Greek philosophy was Democritus (c. 460-370 BC), a student of one of the founders of ancient atomism Leucippus (V century BC). His works are something like an encyclopedia of knowledge of that time. They include more than 70 titles of his works from the field of physics, ethics, mathematics, rhetoric, astronomy, etc. With his works, he earned the deep respect of Aristotle, Cicero, Plutarch and other outstanding thinkers of antiquity.

The greatest merit of Democritus is his doctrine of atomism. At the heart of the universe, according to his views, is the atom as the fundamental principle of the development of the world. Atoms, i.e. the smallest, further indivisible physical particles, are unchanged. They are eternal, in constant motion and differ from each other only in form, size, position and order. Along with atoms, according to Democritus, there is also a void (emptiness is non-existence and, as such, is unknowable, only being is cognizable), in which atoms move.

Democritus also argued that there are two types of knowledge: logical reasoning, which gives reliable knowledge, as well as sensory knowledge: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch. At the same time, it should be noted: Democrit tends to conclude that true knowledge gives the human mind.

An important event in ancient Greek philosophy was the emergence of sophists - "paid teachers to think, speak and do." They were not interested in truth, but in eristika (the art of winning an argument, litigation). Therefore, the word "sophist" acquires a nominal meaning. It meant a person capable of passing off black as white, and vice versa, depending on the task assigned to him.

And yet this direction has made a certain contribution to the development of logic and rhetoric. The Sophists demonstrated the fluidity of concepts as images replacing the designated reality; made a certain contribution to the development of relative truth, raising the question of the need for evidence of the propositions put forward.

The main conclusions of the sophists are as follows:

1) the main property of matter is not its objectivity, but its variability;

2) nothing exists in itself, but exists only in relation to another and through another;

3) everything that exists has its opposite.

In general, the sophists, as masters of rhetoric and eristics, prepared the conclusion that the world around us, due to its uncertainty and variability, is unknowable, and therefore inexplicable.

Representatives of the Sophists: Protagoras of Abdera (c. 480 - 410 BC), Gorgias of Leontin (483 - 375 BC), Hippias of Elis, Prodicus of Ceos, Antiphon, Critias of Athens, Lucian of Samosata, Flavius ​​Philostratus and other.

According to the sophists, a person should be considered a criterion, a measure of the truth of a judgment. It is from here that the famous thesis of Protagoras follows: "Man is the measure of all things that exist, that they exist, non-existent, that they do not exist."

The problem of the beginning among the representatives of idealism in antiquity

Ideal and gp (French idéalisme, from Greek idéa - idea), the general designation of philosophical teachings that assert that consciousness, thinking, mental, spiritual is primary, fundamental, and matter, nature, physical is secondary, derivative, dependent, conditioned. I., thus, opposes materialism in solving the main question of philosophy - about the relationship between being and thinking, spiritual and material, both in the sphere of existence and in the sphere of knowledge.

There are two forms of idealism: objective idealism and subjective idealism.

The first is characterized by the recognition of the spiritual principle outside and independently of our consciousness, the second is unacceptable to admit any reality outside and independently of our consciousness.

Ancient schools of philosophy (idealistic line)

1. Pythagorean school of philosophy

Pythagoras (VI-V centuries BC) - organized in 532. BC. religious-philosophical union in Cortona.

Pythagoras based his philosophy on numerical ratios, understood as universal abstract patterns. "The wisest is the number." It is natural that such an approach contributed to the development of mathematics from empirical practice into a real theoretical science.

2. School of Eleatics

Representatives: Xenophanes - the founder, Parmenides, Zeno, Melissus.

Parmenides (r. ca. 540 BC) - first introduced the philosophical concept - "being". Being with him is the substance, which is indivisible and immovable. In the center of his attention were the problems of the relationship between being and non-being, being and thinking.

When asked about the relationship between being and non-being, Parmenides answered: there is being, but there is no non-being. He was the first to use evidence to substantiate his thesis. What is, can be expressed in thought; what is not, cannot be expressed in thought. Non-being is inexpressible, unknowable, inaccessible to thought, therefore it is non-being.

Zeno (480-43 BC) - tries to comprehend the problems of movement, draws attention to the fact that movement is the sum of states of rest.

3. School of Athens

Representatives: Socrates (469-399 BC), Plato (427-347 BC), Aristotle (384-322 BC).

Socrates.

The main focus of his research was the problem of man. Socrates is interested not just in a person, but in a knowing, moral person.

He believed that the meaning of human life, the highest good - in achieving happiness. Ethics should help a person build a life in accordance with this goal. Happiness is the content of a prudent, virtuous being, i.e. only moral man can be happy (or reasonable, which is basically the same thing).

Knowledge is the basis of virtue (each specific virtue is a certain kind of knowledge), ignorance is the source of immorality. That is, moral values ​​only have a regulative value when they are recognized by a person as true. Therefore, he pays such constant attention to moral education, which is inseparable from self-education, and the process of moral improvement lasts all conscious life.

The dialectical method of Socrates is based on a dialogue, which includes two essential points:

Refutation

maieutics

Mayevtika - the turn of the soul, the movement of the soul, the discovery of the new.

Socrates resorts to irony, which allows him to use certain tricks, tricks and encourage the interlocutor to discover himself (his own opinion).

Plato.

Real name - Aristocles.

He founded his own philosophical school - the Academy. Platon headed the Academy for 40 years.

In Plato's philosophy, there are two most important periods of his work:

1 period - study of existing philosophical problems;

2 period ("second navigation") - Plato formulates his own philosophical ideas, comes to an understanding of two planes of being:

• phenomenal (visible)
• methophenomenal (invisible), comprehended exclusively by the intellect.

The main part of Plato's philosophy, which gave its name to a whole trend of philosophy, is the doctrine of ideas (eidos), the existence of two worlds: the world of ideas (eidos) and the world of things, or forms. Ideas are prototypes of things, their sources. Ideas underlie the whole multitude of things formed from formless matter. Ideas are the source of everything, while matter itself cannot produce anything.

The world of ideas exists outside of time and space. There is a certain hierarchy in this world, at the top of which stands the idea of ​​the Good, from which all the rest flow. Good is identical to absolute Beauty, but at the same time it is the Beginning of all beginnings and the Creator of the Universe. The idea of ​​the Good is like the Sun in the human dimension.

The idea of ​​any thing or being is the deepest, most intimate and essential in it. In man, the role of an idea is played by his immortal soul. Ideas have the qualities of permanence, unity and purity, and things - variability, multiplicity and distortion.

Plato's writings, known as Plato's Dialogues:

• "Apology of Socrates"
• "Phaedo"
• "Parmenides"
• "Feast"
• "State"
• "Laws"
• "Letters"

Plato's doctrine of the state in general terms was first outlined by him in the famous dialogue - "Politician". This dialogue belongs to the early period of Plato's activity and represents an imperfect development of the same thoughts that later formed the basis of Plato's famous dialogue - "The State". This latter belongs to the more mature age of Plato and contains the doctrine of the state in its most perfect form.

In Plato's worldview, an important place belongs to his views on society and the state. He was extremely interested in the question of what a perfect hostel should be and what kind of education people should be prepared to organize and maintain such a hostel.

Plato's project is called the "ideal state" project. He saw 6 varieties of states, among the existing types:

1. Monarchy
2. Tyranny
3. Oligarchy
4. Democracy
5. Timocracy (power of the military)

The philosopher believes that there can be only one device of a perfect state. All possible difference comes down only to the number of ruling sages (philosophers): if there is only one sage, this is a monarchy. If several - the aristocracy. But this difference really does not matter, because if the wisest really rule, then no matter how many there are, they will still rule in exactly the same way.

Plato contrasted the ideal type with a negative type of social structure, in which the main driver of people's behavior is material concerns and incentives. The negative type of state appears, according to Plato, in four possible forms: as timocracy, oligarchy, democracy and tyranny.

The philosopher took a sociological approach in the study of population problems. He divided the entire population of the state into three estates:

1. Philosophers
2. Warriors
3. Employees

Aristotle.

In 335 he founded his own philosophical school - the Lyceum.

Aristotle wrote more than 150 scientific works and treatises. His writings are divided into two groups: "exoteric" (from the Greek. exo - outside, outside), composed in the form of a dialogue and intended for the general public outside the school, and "esoteric" (from the Greek. Ezo - inside), - a product of Aristotle's creative activity during the teaching period, intended not for the public, but only for students within the school. The compositions of the first group have been almost completely lost, only separate fragments or only the titles of the works remain. But the compositions of the second group are well preserved.

The logical works of Aristotle are united under the title "Organon", philosophical problems are studied in "Metaphysics", ethical - in "Nicomachean Ethics", psychological - in the essay "On the Soul", socio-political - in "Politics", etc.

The philosopher formulated three laws of logic:

1. Law of Identity
2. Law of contradiction
3. Law of Sufficient Reason

Aristotle was the first of the ancient thinkers to distinguish philosophical knowledge from concrete scientific knowledge. He highlights first philosophy as the science of beings, or of first principles and causes, and second philosophy whose subject is nature.

The subject of the first philosophy, historically called "metophysics", is not nature, but that which exists beyond it - supersensible eternal entities comprehended by speculation. The first philosophy was in the understanding of Aristotle a philosophy in the proper sense of the word, while physics, or the doctrine of nature, was also a philosophy, but the second.

In Metaphysics, Aristotle divides science into three broad sections:

• Theoretical sciences - the search for knowledge
• Practical Sciences - Ethics
• Productive sciences related to production

At the center of the first philosophy are the problems of being. Aristotle developed the doctrine of the four principles (root causes) of everything that exists:

1. Formal (the essence of being, what things are made of)
2. Material (- as the primary matter, indefinite and formless, but having the ability to become a form; - what a thing consists of - the formed material of being)
3. Driving (reveals the possibilities of the movement itself)
4. Final / target (denotes the movement of the final goal; on the basis of this reason, the possibility of achieving the Good is achieved)

Complete the Aristotelian concept of first causes doctrine of absolute Mind as the highest level of being, which is no longer conditioned by anything, but depends only on itself. The philosophical doctrine of higher being appears as theology. Aristotle's God is the impersonal divine Mind, which is in constant activity. The thought of God is the thought of a thought. Being the highest being, the divine Mind acts as a triune formally moving target cause.

In his writings on psychology, Aristotle speaks of three manifestations of the soul:

• vegetable soul;
• animal soul;
• the rational soul of man.

Three writings on ethics are associated with the name of Aristotle: Nicomachean Ethics, Eudemic Ethics and Great Ethics. The basis of Aristotle's ethics is psychology. The ethics of the philosopher occupies a middle position between his psychology and politics. Ethics is the doctrine of morality, of instilling in a person the active-volitional, spiritual qualities that he needs first of all in public life, and then in his personal life. It teaches the practical rules of behavior and the way of life of the individual. But Aristotle does not think of an individual citizen outside of society. For him, man is a being. socio-political. The ethics of Aristotle is closely connected with his politics, with the doctrine of the essence and tasks of the state.

In studies of the problems of the state, Aristotle draws attention to the problems of the existing policy. Man at this time is regarded as a "political animal". Not everyone is considered a citizen of the state (a slave is not a citizen of the state)

Aristotle identifies six main types of state:

1. extreme oligarchy
2. Ochlocracy (extreme democracy)
3. Politia (moderate oligarchy + moderate democracy)

Like Plato, Aristotle divides the forms of the state into "bad and good." Good: monarchy, aristocracy, polity. And the bad ones: tyranny, extreme oligarchy, ochlocracy.

The doctrine of the beginning in the philosophy of ancient atomists. The significance of this doctrine in the history of the development of philosophy and science.

Representatives of the ancient philosophy of the atomists are Leucippus, Democritus, Epicurus, Lucretius.

One of the influential teachings of this time was atomistic materialism. Its most prominent representative was Democritus. Up to 70 of his works are known, covering almost all areas of knowledge of that time - philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, politics and ethics. Continuing the tradition of searching for the origin of all things, Democritus introduced the idea that the world consists of being and non-being. Non-existence is emptiness, and being is atoms.

An atom is an indivisible, completely dense, impenetrable, not perceived by the senses (due to its, as a rule, small size), an independent particle of matter, an atom is indivisible, eternal, unchanged. Atoms never come into being and never die. They come in a wide variety of shapes - spherical, angular, hook-shaped, concave, convex, etc. Atoms vary in size. They are invisible, they can only be thought. In the process of moving in the void, the atoms collide with each other and interlock. The cohesion of a large number of atoms makes things. The rise and fall of things is explained by the addition and division of atoms; changing things - by changing the order and position (rotation) of atoms. If atoms are eternal and unchanging, then things are transient and changeable. Thus, atomism combined in one picture the rational moments of two opposing teachings - the teachings of Heraclitus and Parmenides: the world of things is fluid, changeable, and the world of atoms that make up things is unchanging, eternal.
According to Democritus, the world as a whole is an infinite void stuffed with many separate worlds. Separate worlds were formed as a result of the fact that many atoms, colliding with each other, form vortices - circular motions of atoms. In vortices, large and heavy atoms accumulate in the center, while lighter and small ones are forced out to the periphery. This is how earth and sky came into being. The sky forms fire, air, luminaries. Earth is the center of our world, on the edge of which are the stars. Every world is closed. The number of worlds is infinite. Many of them may be inhabited. Democritus first described Milky Way like a huge cluster of stars. The worlds are transient: some of them are just emerging, others are in their prime, and still others are already dying.
The historical merit of ancient atomism was also the formulation and development of the principle of determinism (causality). In accordance with this principle, any events entail certain consequences and at the same time represent a consequence of some other events that took place earlier. Democritus understood the principle of determinism mechanistically, identifying causality and necessity. Everything that happens in the world is not only causally determined, but also necessary, inevitable. He rejected the objective existence of chance, saying that a person calls an event random when he does not know (or does not want to know) the cause of the event. The world of atomists is a world of continuous necessity, in which there are no objective accidents.

Epicurus shares the atomistic concept of Democritus, but does not repeat it, but contributes to the further development of the atomistic picture of the world. Epicurus removes rigid determinism, which manifests itself in society as a fatal inevitability. Admitting an accident, Epicurus, as it were, opens the first page in reading the problem of freedom and necessity in relation to the development of society.
The concept of atomism is one of the most heuristic, one of the most fruitful and promising research programs in the history of science. Based on the principle of atomism, considering bodies as the sum of an infinitely large number of small indivisible atoms, Democritus formulated the idea mathematical method indivisible, which allows you to determine the ratio of the areas of figures or volumes of bodies. The method of indivisibles, revived in European mathematics in the 16th-17th centuries, became one of the milestones on the way to the creation of integral calculus. The concept of atomism played a decisive role in the development of ideas about the structure of matter, in the orientation of the movement of natural science thought towards the knowledge of ever deeper structural levels of the organization of matter. And now, 2500 years after its inception, the program of atomism (applied no longer to atoms, but to the elementary particles of which they are composed) is one of the cornerstones of natural science, the modern physical picture of the world.

Conclusion

Summing up the analysis of ancient philosophy, it should be noted that during the period of its formation and development, the main problems of philosophy developed, and its main lines of development were revealed. Philosophy arises as a doctrine of being. At the initial stages, being is identified with nature. Hence - the materialistic direction in the development of philosophical thought. Later, with the development of social relations and the formation of personality, being is comprehended, first of all, as the being of a person, philosophical thought takes an idealistic direction. Being in ancient philosophy is considered as an ordered system - the Cosmos, an important component of which is man. All human problems are considered and solved in organic connection with the place and role he occupies in the Cosmos. This approach can be fixed among physicists, and among the sophists, and among the Epicureans, and among the Stoics. But he found the brightest and most complete embodiment in the systems of Plato and Aristotle.

The problem of understanding the nature and essence of the world. Two main approaches to its solution are materialistic and idealistic. The first sees the essence of the world in the material substance, the second - in the ideal.

The problem of the cause of development (self-development) of the world. Two solutions:

a) a cause is an external force that affects the world and causes it to change and develop;

b) the reason for the development of the world lies in itself (the unity and struggle of opposites).

The problem of the nature and essence of knowledge. Two approaches:

a) knowledge is knowledge about reality existing world which we know with the help of feelings and reason;

b) knowledge is knowledge about the supersensible, intelligible world, which is inaccessible to the senses and which is known with the help of intellectual intuition.

The problem of the nature and essence of law and the state. Two approaches:

a) the state and law are means of subjugating some people by others;

b) the state and law are the means of organizing happiness life together of people.

All these problems have become key problems of European philosophy and science. Even an incomplete analysis of the noted schools testifies that they prepared medieval philosophy, focused attention on the spiritual principle, and laid a theoretical foundation for Christianity.

Sources

1. Philosophy, Moscow, UNITI - 1998
2. Anthology of world philosophy: In 4 volumes, M., - 1969. V.1, p. 279; Fragments of early Greek philosophers. Part 1
3. Aristotle. Works in four volumes. M., 1975-1984, Vol. 1-4.
4. Concepts modern natural science, V.M. Naidysh, Moscow - 1999
5. Wikipedia - free encyclopedia - http://ru.wikipedia.org
6. Great Soviet Encyclopedia. Electronic version - http://bse.sci-lib.com

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Philosophy essay

topic:

"ANTIQUE PHILOSOPHY: main problems, concepts and schools"

Introduction

1 Milesian school and the school of Pythagoras. Heraclitus and the Eleatics. Atomists

2 Schools of Socrates, Sophists and Plato

3 Aristotle

4 Philosophy of early Hellenism (Stoicism, Epicureanism, Skepticism)

5 Neoplatonism

Conclusion

List of used literature

Introduction

Most researchers are unanimous that philosophy as an integral cultural phenomenon is the creation of the genius of the ancient Greeks (VII-VI centuries BC). Already in the poems of Homer and Hesiod impressive attempts are being made to represent the world and man's place in it. The desired goal is achieved mainly by means characteristic of art (artistic images) and religion (belief in the gods).

Philosophy supplemented myths and religions by strengthening rational motivations, developing interest in systematic rational thinking based on concepts. Initially, the formation of philosophy in the Greek world was also facilitated by the political freedoms achieved by the Greeks in the city-states. Philosophers, whose number increased, and the activity became more and more professional, could resist political and religious authorities. It was in the ancient Greek world that philosophy was first constituted as an independent cultural entity that existed alongside art and religion, and not as a component of them.

Ancient philosophy developed over the course of the 12th-13th centuries, from the 7th century. BC. according to the VI century. AD AT historical plan Ancient philosophy can be divided into five periods:

1) the naturalistic period, where the main attention was paid to the problems of nature (fusis) and the Cosmos (Miletians, Pythagoreans, Eleatics, in short, pre-Socratics);

2) the humanistic period with its attention to human problems, primarily to ethical problems (Socrates, sophists);

3) the classical period with its grandiose philosophical systems of Plato and Aristotle;

4) the period of the Hellenistic schools (Stoics, Epicurians, skeptics), engaged in the moral arrangement of people;

5) Neoplatonism, with its universal synthesis, brought to the idea of ​​the One Good.

The presented work discusses the basic concepts and schools of ancient philosophy.

1 Milesian school of philosophy and the school of Pythagoras. Heraclitus and the Eleatics. Atomists.

One of the oldest philosophical schools is Miletus (7th-5th centuries BC). Thinkers from the city of Miletus (Ancient Greece) - Thales, Anaximenes and Anaximander.

All three thinkers took decisive steps towards the demythologization of the ancient worldview. "What is everything from?" - this is the question that interested the Milesians in the first place. The very formulation of the question is in its own way brilliant, because it has as its premise the conviction that everything can be explained, but for this it is necessary to find a single source for everything. Thales considered water to be such a source, Anaximenes - air, Anaximander - some infinite and eternal beginning, apeiron (the term "apeiron" literally means "infinite"). Things arise as a result of those transformations that occur with primary matter - condensation, discharge, evaporation. According to the Milesians, everything is based on the primary substance. Substance, by definition, is that which needs no other explanation for its explanation. The water of Thales, the air of Anaximenes are substances.

To appreciate the views of the Milesians, let us turn to science. Postulated by the Milesians The Milesians did not manage to go beyond the limits of the world of events and phenomena, but they made such attempts, and in the right direction. They were looking for something natural, but imagined it as an event.

School of Pythagoras. Pythagoras is also occupied with the problem of substances, but fire, earth, water as such no longer suit him. He comes to the conclusion that "everything is a number." The Pythagoreans saw in numbers the properties and relationships inherent in harmonic combinations. The Pythagoreans did not pass by the fact that if the lengths of the strings in a musical instrument (monochord) are related to each other as 1:2, 2:3, 3:4, then the resulting musical intervals will correspond to what is called an octave, fifth and fourth . Simple numerical relations began to be sought in geometry and astronomy. Pythagoras, and Thales before him, apparently used the simplest mathematical proofs, which, quite possibly, were borrowed in the East (in Babylonia). The invention of mathematical proof was of decisive importance for the emergence of the type of rationality characteristic of modern civilized man.

In assessing the philosophical significance of the views of Pythagoras, one should pay tribute to his insight. From the point of view of philosophy, the appeal to the phenomenon of numbers was of particular importance. The Pythagoreans explained events on the basis of numbers and their ratios and thus surpassed the Milesians, for they almost reached the level of the laws of science. Any absolutization of numbers, as well as their regularities, is a revival of the historical limitations of Pythagoreanism. This fully applies to the magic of numbers, which, it must be said, the Pythagoreans paid tribute to with all the generosity of an enthusiastic soul.

Finally, we should especially note the search by the Pythagoreans for harmony in everything, for beautiful quantitative consistency. Such a search is actually aimed at discovering laws, and this is one of the most difficult scientific tasks. The ancient Greeks were very fond of harmony, admired it and knew how to create it in their lives.

Heraclitus and the Eleatics. Further development philosophical thought is most convincingly presented in the well-known opposition of the teachings of Heraclitus of Ephesus and Parmenides and Zeno of Elea.

Both sides agree that the external senses are not capable of giving true knowledge by themselves, the truth is reached by reflection. Heraclitus believes that the logos rules the world. The concept of logos can be regarded as a naive understanding of regularity. Specifically, he meant that everything in the world consists of opposites, opposing, everything happens through strife, struggle. As a result, everything changes, flows; figuratively speaking, you cannot step into the same river twice. In the struggle of opposites, their inner identity is revealed. For example, "the life of some is the death of others", and in general - life is death. Since everything is interconnected, then any property is relative: "donkeys would prefer straw to gold." Heraclitus still overly trusts the world of events, which determines both the weak and strong sides of his views. On the one hand, he notices, albeit in a naive form, the most important properties of the world of events - their interaction, connectedness, relativity. On the other hand, he still does not know how to analyze the world of events from positions characteristic of a scientist, i.e. with proofs, concepts. The world for Heraclitus is fire, and fire is an image of eternal movement and change.

The Heraclitean philosophy of the identity of opposites, contradictions, was sharply criticized by the Eleatics. So, Parmenides considered those people for whom "to be" and "not to be" are considered one and the same and not the same, and for everything there is a way back (this is a clear allusion to Heraclitus), "two-headed."

Special attention The Eleatics paid attention to the problem of multiplicity, in this regard they came up with a number of paradoxes (aporias), which still cause headaches among philosophers, physicists and mathematicians. A paradox is an unexpected statement, an aporia is a difficulty, bewilderment, an intractable task.

According to the Eleatics, in spite of sensory impressions, plurality cannot be conceived. If things can be infinitely small, then their sum will in no way give something finite, a finite thing. But if things are finite, then between finite two things there is always a third thing; we again come to a contradiction, for a finite thing consists of an infinite number of finite things, which is impossible. Not only multiplicity is impossible, but also movement. In the argument "dichotomy" (division into two) it is proved that in order to pass a certain path, one must first pass half of it, and in order to pass it, one must pass a quarter of the path, and then one eighth of the path, and so on ad infinitum. It turns out that it is impossible to get from a given point to the one closest to it, because it actually does not exist. If movement is impossible, then swift-footed Achilles cannot catch up with the tortoise and it will be necessary to admit that the flying arrow does not fly.

So, Heraclitus is interested, first of all, in change and movement, their origins, the reasons that he sees in the struggle of opposites. Eleatics are primarily concerned with how to understand, how to interpret what everyone considers change and movement. According to the reflections of the Eleatics, the absence of a consistent explanation of the nature of the movement casts doubt on its reality.

Atomists. The crisis caused by the aporias of Zeno was very deep; in order to overcome it at least partially, some special, unusual ideas were required. This was done by the ancient atomists, the most prominent among whom were Leucippus and Democritus.

To get rid of the difficulty of understanding change once and for all, it was assumed that atoms are unchanging, indivisible and homogeneous. The atomists, as it were, "reduced" change to the immutable, to atoms.

According to Democritus, there are atoms and emptiness. Atoms differ in shape, location, weight. Atoms move in different directions. Earth, water, air, fire are the primary groupings of atoms. Combinations of atoms form whole worlds: in infinite space there are an infinite number of worlds. Of course, man is also a collection of atoms. The human soul is made up of special atoms. Everything happens according to necessity, there is no accident.

The philosophical achievement of the atomists consists in discovering the atomic, the elementary. Whatever you deal with physical phenomenon, with theory, there is always the elementary: an atom (in chemistry), a gene (in biology), a material point (in mechanics), etc. The elementary appears as unchanging, not in need of explanation.

The naivety in the ideas of the atomists is explained by the underdevelopment of their views. Having discovered atomicity in the world of events and phenomena, they were not yet able to give it a theoretical description. Therefore, it is not surprising that very soon the ancient atomism met with difficulties that it was not destined to overcome.

2 Schools of Socrates, Sophists and Plato

The views of Socrates have come down to us mainly thanks to the works of Plato, a student of Socrates, beautiful both philosophically and artistically. In this regard, it is appropriate to combine the names of Socrates and Plato. First about Socrates. Socrates differs in many ways from the philosophers already mentioned, who mainly dealt with nature, and therefore they are called natural philosophers. Natural philosophers sought to build a hierarchy in the world of events, to understand, for example, how the sky, earth, and stars were formed. Socrates also wants to understand the world, but in a fundamentally different manner, moving not from events to events, but from the general to events. In this respect, his discussion of beauty is typical.

Socrates says that he knows many beautiful things: a sword, and a spear, and a girl, and a pot, and a mare. But each thing is beautiful in its own way, so it is impossible to associate beauty with one of the things. In that case, the other thing would no longer be beautiful. But all beautiful things have something in common - beautiful as such, this is their common idea, eidos, or meaning.

Since the general can be discovered not by feelings, but by the mind, Socrates attributed the general to the world of the mind and thereby laid the foundations for some reason hated by many idealism. Socrates, like no one else, caught that there is a generic, common. Beginning with Socrates, mankind confidently began to master not only the world of events, but also the world of the generic, common. He comes to the conclusion that the main idea- this is the idea of ​​the good, it determines the suitability and usefulness of everything else, including justice. For Socrates, there is nothing higher than the ethical. Such an idea will later occupy a worthy place in the reflections of philosophers.

But what is ethically justified, virtuous? Socrates answers: virtue consists in the knowledge of good and in action in accordance with this knowledge. He connects morality with reason, which gives reason to consider his ethics rationalistic.

But how to acquire knowledge? On this account, Socrates developed a certain method - dialectics, consisting of irony and the birth of a thought, a concept. The irony is that the exchange of opinions initially gives a negative result: "I know that I don't know anything." However, this is not the end of the matter, the enumeration of opinions, their discussion allows you to reach new thoughts. Surprisingly, the dialectic of Socrates has fully retained its significance to the present day. Exchange of opinions, dialogue, discussion are the most important means of obtaining new knowledge, understanding the degree of one's own limitations.

Finally, Socrates' principles should be noted. For allegedly taking place on the part of Socrates, the corruption of youth and the introduction of new deities, he was condemned. Having many opportunities to avoid execution, Socrates, nevertheless, proceeding from the conviction that it is necessary to observe the laws of the country, that death refers to the mortal body, but by no means to the eternal soul (the soul is eternal, like everything common), took hemlock poison.

Sophists. Socrates argued a lot and from a position of principle with the sophists (V-IV centuries BC; the sophist is a teacher of wisdom). The Sophists and Socrates lived in a turbulent era: wars, the destruction of states, the transition from tyranny to slave-owning democracy and vice versa. Under these conditions, I want to understand a person in contrast to nature. Nature, the natural, the sophists opposed the artificial. In society there is no natural, including traditions, customs, religion. Here the right to exist is given only to what is justified, proven, in which it was possible to convince fellow tribesmen. Proceeding from this, the sophists, these enlighteners of ancient Greek society, paid close attention to the problems of language and logic. In their speeches, the sophists strove to be both eloquent and logical. They perfectly understood that correct and convincing speech is the work of the "master of names" and logic.

The original interest of the sophists in society, in man, was reflected in the position of Protagoras: "Man is the measure of all things: existing, that they exist, non-existent, that they do not exist." If there were no words after the colon and the sentence was limited to the statement that "man is the measure of all things", then we would be dealing with the principle of humanism: a person in his actions proceeds from his own interests. But Protagoras insists on more: man is even the measure of the very existence of things. We are talking about the relativity of everything that exists, including the relativity of knowledge. The thought of Protagoras is complex, but it has often been understood in a simplified way: as each thing seems to me, it is so. Naturally, in terms of modern science such reasoning is naive, the arbitrariness of subjective evaluation is not recognized in science; to avoid it, there are many ways, such as measurement. One is cold, the other is hot, and a thermometer is in place here to determine the true temperature of the air. However, Protagoras's thought is rather unusual: sensation really cannot be mistaken - but in what sense? The fact that the cold must be warmed, the sick must be cured. Protagoras translates the problem into a practical sphere. This shows the dignity of his philosophical attitude, it protects from oblivion of real life, which, as you know, is by no means a rarity.

But is it possible to agree that all judgments and sensations are equally true? Hardly. It becomes obvious that Protagoras did not escape the extremes of relativism - the doctrine of the conventionality and relativity of human knowledge.

Of course, not all sophists were equally sophisticated masters in polemics, some of them gave reason to understand sophistry in the bad sense of the word, as a way of constructing false conclusions and not without a selfish goal. Here is the ancient sophism "Horned": "What you have not lost, you have; you have not lost the horns, therefore, you have them."

Plato. On the ideas of Plato. Anyone who even knows very little about philosophy, however, must have heard the name of Plato, the outstanding thinker of antiquity. Plato seeks to develop Socratic ideas. Things are not considered only in their apparently so habitual empirical existence. For every thing, its meaning is fixed, the idea, which, as it turns out, is the same for every thing of a given class of things and is denoted by one name. There are many horses, dwarf and normal, piebald and black, but they all have the same meaning - horsepower. Accordingly, we can talk about the beautiful in general, the good in general, the green in general, the house in general. Plato is convinced that one cannot do without turning to ideas, because this is the only way to overcome the diversity, the inexhaustibility of the sensory-empirical world.

But if, along with separate things, there are also ideas, each of which belongs to some particular class of things, then, naturally, the question arises about the relationship of the one (the idea) with the many. How are things and ideas related to each other? Plato considers this connection in two ways: as a transition from things to an idea and as a transition from an idea to things. He understands that the idea and the thing are somehow involved in each other. But, says Plato, the degree of their involvement can reach different levels of perfection. Among many horses, we can easily find both more and less perfect. The closest thing to the idea of ​​horseness is the most perfect horse. Then it turns out that within the framework of the correlation thing - idea - idea is the limit of the formation of a thing; within the framework of the idea-thing relationship, the idea is the generative model of the class of things to which it participates.

Thought, word - these are the prerogatives of man. Ideas exist even without man. Ideas are objective. Plato is an objective idealist, the most prominent representative of objective idealism. The general exists, and in the person of Plato objective idealism has a great service to humanity. Meanwhile, the general (the idea) and the particular (the thing) are so closely involved in each other that there is no real mechanism for the transition from one to the other.

Cosmology of Plato. Plato dreamed of creating a comprehensive concept of the world. Fully aware of the power of the apparatus of ideas he created, he strove to develop an idea of ​​both the Cosmos and society. It is highly significant how Plato uses his conception of ideas in this connection, modestly remarking that he claims only a "plausible opinion." Plato gives a cosmic picture of the world in the Timaeus dialogue.

The world soul in its initial state is divided into elements - fire, air, earth. According to the harmonic mathematical relations, God gave the Cosmos the most perfect form - the form of a sphere. In the center of the Cosmos is the Earth. The orbits of planets and stars obey harmonic mathematical relationships. God the demiurge also creates living beings.

So, the Cosmos is a living being endowed with reason. The structure of the world is as follows: the divine mind (demiurge), the world soul and the world body. Everything that happens, temporal, as well as time itself, is an image of the eternal, ideas.

Plato's picture of the Cosmos summed up the natural philosophy of nature in the 4th century. BC. For many centuries, at least until the Renaissance, this picture of the world stimulated philosophical and private scientific research.

In a number of respects, the Platonic picture of the world does not stand up to criticism. It is speculative, invented, does not correspond to modern scientific data. But what is surprising is that even taking into account all this, it would be very reckless to hand it over to the archive. The fact is that not everyone has access to scientific data, especially in some generalized, systematized form. Plato was a great systematist, his picture of the Cosmos is simple, in its own way understandable to many. It is unusually figurative: the Cosmos is animated, harmonious, in it at every step there is a divine mind. For these and other reasons, the Platonic picture of the Cosmos has its supporters to this day. We also see the justification for this situation in the fact that, in a hidden, undeveloped form, it contains a potential that can be used productively even today. Plato's Timaeus is a myth, but a special myth, built with logical and aesthetic elegance. This is not only a significant philosophical, but also a work of art.

Plato's doctrine of society. Thinking about society, Plato again seeks to use the concept of ideas. The diversity of human needs and the impossibility of satisfying them alone is an incentive to create a state. According to Plato, justice is the greatest good. Injustice is evil. The latter he refers to the following types of government: timocracy (the power of the ambitious), oligarchy (the power of the rich), tyranny and democracy, accompanied by arbitrariness and anarchy.

Fair state structure Plato "deduces" from the three parts of the soul: rational, affective and lustful. Some are reasonable, wise, they are capable and, therefore, they must govern the state. Others are affective, courageous, they are destined to be strategists, commanders, warriors. Still others, who predominantly have a lustful soul, are restrained, they need to be artisans, farmers. So, there are three estates: rulers; strategists; farmers and artisans. Further, Plato gives a lot of specific recipes, for example, what should be taught and how to educate, suggests depriving the guards of their property, establishing a community of wives and children for them, and introducing various kinds of regulations (sometimes petty). Literature is subjected to strict censorship, everything that can discredit the idea of ​​virtue. In the afterlife - and the soul of a person as an idea continues to exist even after his death - bliss awaits the virtuous, and terrible torment awaits the vicious.

Plato starts with an idea, then he proceeds from an ideal. All the smartest authors do the same, using ideas about the idea and the ideal. Plato's ideal is justice. The ideological basis of Plato's reflections deserves the highest appreciation, without it it is impossible to imagine a modern person.

Ethics of Plato. Plato was able to identify many of the most acute philosophical problems. One of them concerns the relationship between the concept of ideas and ethics. At the top of the hierarchy of Socratic and Platonic ideas is the idea of ​​the good. But why exactly the idea of ​​the good, and not the idea, for example, of beauty or truth? Plato argues in this way: "... that which gives truth to cognizable things, and endows a person with the ability to know, then you consider the idea of ​​​​good, the cause of knowledge and knowability of truth. No matter how beautiful both are knowledge and truth, - but if you will regard the idea of ​​the good as something even more beautiful, you will be right." The good manifests itself in various ideas: both in the idea of ​​beauty and in the idea of ​​truth. In other words, Plato puts the ethical (i.e., the idea of ​​the good) above the aesthetic (the idea of ​​beauty) and scientific-cognitive (the idea of ​​truth). Plato is well aware that the ethical, the aesthetic, the cognitive, the political somehow correlate with each other, one determines the other. He, being consistent in his reasoning, "loads" each idea with moral content.

3 Aristotle

Aristotle, along with Plato, his teacher, is the greatest ancient Greek philosopher. In a number of respects, Aristotle seems to act as a decisive opponent of Plato. In fact, he continues the work of his teacher. Aristotle enters into the subtleties of various kinds of situations in more detail than Plato. He is more concrete, more empirical than Plato, he is truly interested in the individual, vital given.

Original individual being Aristotle calls substance. This is a being that is not capable of being in another, being, it exists in itself. According to Aristotle, a single being is a combination of matter and eidos (form). Matter is the possibility of being and, at the same time, a certain substratum. From copper you can make a ball, a statue, i.e. as the matter of copper there is the possibility of a ball and a statue. In relation to a separate object, the essence is always a form (globularity in relation to a copper ball). The form is expressed by the concept. So, the concept of a ball is also valid when a ball has not yet been made of copper. When matter is formed, then there is no matter without form, just as there is no form without matter. It turns out that eidos - a form - is both the essence of a separate, single object, and what is covered by this concept. Aristotle stands at the foundations of the modern scientific style of thinking. By the way, when modern man speaks and thinks about essence, he owes his rationalistic attitude to Aristotle.

Every thing has four causes: essence (form), matter (substrate), action (the beginning of movement) and purpose ("what for"). But both the effective cause and the final cause are determined by the eidos, the form. Eidos determines the transition from matter-thingness to reality, this is the main dynamic and semantic content of a thing. Here we are dealing, perhaps, with the main content aspect of Aristotelianism, the central principle of which is the formation and manifestation of essence, primary attention to the dynamics of processes, movement, change and everything connected with this, in particular, to the problem of time.

There is a whole hierarchy of things (thing = matter + form), from inorganic objects to plants, living organisms and humans (human eidos is his soul). In this hierarchical chain, the extreme links are of particular interest. By the way, the beginning and the end of any process usually have a special meaning.

The concept of the mind-prime mover was the logical final link in the ideas developed by Aristotle about the unity of matter and eidos. The mind-prime mover Aristotle calls God. But this, of course, is not a personified Christian God. Subsequently, through the centuries, Christian theologians will react with interest to Aristotelian views. Possibility-dynamic understanding of everything that exists by Aristotle led to a number of very fruitful approaches to solving certain problems, in particular to the problem of space and time. Aristotle considered them following the movement, and not just as independent substances. Space acts as a collection of places, each place belongs to some thing. Time is the number of motion; like a number, it is the same for different movements.

Logic and methodology. In the works of Aristotle, logic and categorical in general, i.e. conceptual, analysis. Many modern researchers believe that the most important thing in logic was done by Aristotle.

Aristotle examines in great detail a number of categories, each of which appears in his threefold form: 1) as a kind of being; 2) as a form of thought; 3) as a statement. The categories that Aristotle uses especially skillfully are the following: essence, property, relation, quantity and quality, movement (action), space and time. But Aristotle operates not only with separate categories, he analyzes statements, the relationship between which is determined by the three famous laws of formal logic.

The first law of logic is the law of identity (A is A), i.e. the concept must be used in the same sense. The second law of logic is the law of excluded contradiction (A is not not-A). The third law of logic is the law of the excluded middle (A or not-A is true, "there is no third").

Based on the laws of logic, Aristotle builds the doctrine of syllogism. Syllogism cannot be identified with proof in general.

Aristotle very clearly reveals the content of the famous Socratic dialogical method. The dialogue contains: 1) statement of the question; 2) a strategy for asking questions and getting answers to them; 3) correct construction inferences.

Society. Ethics. In his teaching about society, Aristotle is more specific and far-sighted than Plato, together with the latter, he believes that the meaning of life is not in pleasures, as hedonists believed, but in the most perfect goals and happiness, in the implementation of virtues. But contrary to Plato, the good should be achievable, and not an otherworldly ideal. Man's goal is to become a virtuous being, not a vicious one. Virtues are acquired qualities, among them the most important are wisdom, prudence, courage, generosity, generosity. The harmonious combination of all virtues is justice. Virtue can and should be learned. They act as a middle ground, a compromise of a prudent Man: "nothing too much ...". Generosity is the mean between vanity and cowardice, courage is the mean between reckless courage and cowardice, generosity is the mean between wastefulness and avarice. Aristotle defines ethics in general as a practical philosophy.

Aristotle divides the forms of government into correct (common benefit is achieved) and incorrect (meaning only benefit for some).

Correct forms: monarchy, aristocracy, polity

Irregular forms, taking into account the number of rulers: one - tyranny; a wealthy minority is an oligarchy; the majority is a democracy

Aristotle associates a certain state structure with principles. The principle of aristocracy is virtue, the principle of oligarchy is wealth, the principle of democracy is freedom and poverty, including spiritual.

Aristotle actually summed up the development of classical ancient Greek philosophy. He created a highly differentiated system of knowledge, the development of which continues to this day.

4 Philosophy of early Hellenism (Stoicism, Epicureanism, Skepticism)

Consider the three main philosophical currents of early Hellenism: Stoicism, Epicureanism, Skepticism. On their occasion, a brilliant connoisseur of ancient philosophy. A.F. Losev argued that they were nothing more than a subjective variety, respectively, of the pre-Socratic theory of material elements (fire first of all), the philosophy of Democritus and the philosophy of Heraclitus: the theory of fire - Stoicism, ancient atomism - Epicureanism, the philosophy of fluidity of Heraclitus - skepticism.

Stoicism. As a philosophical trend, Stoicism has existed since the 3rd century. BC. until the 3rd century AD The main representatives of early Stoicism were Zeno of Kita, Cleanthes and Chrysippus. Later, Plutarch, Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius became famous as Stoics.

The Stoics believed that the body of the world was composed of fire, air, earth and water. The soul of the world is a fiery and airy pneuma, a kind of all-penetrating breath. According to a long ancient tradition, fire was considered by the Stoics to be the main element, of all the elements it is the most pervasive, vital. Thanks to this, the entire Cosmos, including man, is a single fiery organism with its own laws (logos) and fluidity. The main question for the Stoics is to determine the place of man in the cosmos.

After carefully considering the situation, the Stoics come to the conclusion that the laws of being are not subject to man, man is subject to fate, fate. There is nowhere to escape from fate, reality must be accepted as it is, with all its fluidity of bodily properties, which ensures the diversity of human life. Fate, fate can be hated, but the stoic is rather inclined to love it, getting rest within the limits of what is available.

The Stoics seek to discover the meaning of life. They considered the Word, its semantic meaning (lekton), to be the essence of the subjective. Lekton - meaning - is above all positive and negative judgments, we are talking about judgment in general. Lekton is also carried out during inner life person, creating a state of ataraxia, i.e. peace of mind, equanimity. The Stoic is by no means indifferent to everything that happens, on the contrary, he treats everything with maximum attention and interest. But he still understands the world in a certain way, its logos, law, and, in full accordance with it, retains peace of mind. So, the main points of the Stoic picture of the world are as follows:

1) Cosmos is a fiery organism;

2) a person exists within the framework of cosmic laws, hence his fatalism, fatefulness, a kind of love for both;

3) the meaning of the world and man - lekton, the significance of the word, which is neutral both to the mental and to the physical;

4) understanding the world inevitably leads to a state of ataraxia, dispassion;

5) not only an individual person, but also people as a whole constitute an inseparable unity with the Cosmos; The cosmos can and should be considered both as a god and as a world state (thus, the idea of ​​pantheism (nature is God) and the idea of ​​human equality are developed).

Already the early Stoics identified a number of profound philosophical problems. If a person is subject to various kinds of laws, physical, biological, social, then to what extent is he free? How should he deal with everything that limits him? In order to somehow cope with these questions, it is necessary and useful to go through the school of Stoic thought.

Epicureanism. The largest representatives of Epicureanism are Epicurus himself and Lucretius Carus. Epicureanism as a philosophical trend existed at the same historical time as Stoicism - this is the period of the 5th-6th centuries at the turn of the old and new eras. Like the Stoics, the Epicureans put, first of all, questions of dispensation, comfort of the individual. The fire-likeness of the soul is a common idea among the Stoics and Epicureans, but the Stoics see some meaning behind it, and the Epicureans see the basis of sensations. For the Stoics, in the foreground is the mind, consistent with nature, and for the Epicureans, the feeling, consistent with nature. The sensible world is what is of primary interest to the Epicureans. Hence the basic ethical principle of the Epicureans is pleasure. The doctrine that puts pleasure at the forefront is called hedonism. The Epicureans did not understand the content of the feeling of pleasure in a simplistic way, and certainly not in a vulgar spirit. Epicurus speaks of noble calm, if you like, balanced pleasure.

For the Epicureans, the sensible world is the real reality. The world of sensuality is extraordinarily changeable, multiple. There are extreme forms of feelings, sensible atoms, or, in other words, atoms not in themselves, but in the world of feelings. Epicurus endows atoms with spontaneity, "free will". Atoms move along curves, intertwine and unwind. The idea of ​​stoic rock is coming to an end.

The Epicurean does not have any master over him, there is no need, he has free will. He can retire, indulge in his own pleasures, immerse himself in himself. The Epicurean is not afraid of death: "As long as we exist, there is no death; when death is, we are no more." Life is the main pleasure with its beginning and even end. (Dying, Epicurus took a warm bath and asked for wine to be brought to him.)

A person consists of atoms, which provide him with the richness of the world of sensations, where he can always find a comfortable home for himself, refusing to be active, striving to rebuild the world. The Epicurean attitude towards the life world is completely unselfish and at the same time strives to merge with it. If we bring the qualities of the Epicurean sage to the absolute limit, then we will get an idea of ​​​​the gods. They also consist of atoms, but not decaying atoms, and therefore the gods are immortal. The gods are blessed, they have no need to interfere in the affairs of people and the universe. Yes, this would not give any positive result, because in a world where there is free will, there is not and cannot be sustainable purposeful actions. Therefore, the gods on Earth have nothing to do, Epicurus places them in the interworld space, where they rush about. But Epicurus does not deny the worship of God (he himself visited the temple). By honoring the gods, man himself is strengthened in the correctness of his own self-withdrawal from active practical life along the paths of Epicurean ideas. We list the main ones:

1) everything consists of atoms, which can spontaneously deviate from rectilinear trajectories;

2) a person consists of atoms, which provides him with a wealth of feelings and pleasures;

3) the world of feelings is not illusory, it is the main content of the human, everything else, including the ideal-thinking, "closes" to sensory life;

4) the gods are indifferent to human affairs (this, they say, is evidenced by the presence of evil in the world).

5) for a happy life, a person needs three main components: the absence of bodily suffering (aponia), equanimity of the soul (ataraxia), friendship (as an alternative to political and other confrontations).

Skepticism. Skepticism is a characteristic feature of all ancient philosophy; as an independent philosophical direction, it functions during the period of relevance of Stoicism and Epicureanism. The largest representatives are Pyrrho and Sextus Empiricus.

The ancient skeptic rejected the intelligibility of life. To maintain inner peace, a person needs to know a lot from philosophy, but not in order to deny something or, conversely, to affirm (every affirmation is a negation, and, conversely, every negation is an affirmation). The ancient skeptic is by no means a nihilist; he lives as he wants, avoiding in principle the need to evaluate anything. The skeptic is in constant philosophical search, but he is convinced that true knowledge is, in principle, unattainable. Being appears in all the diversity of its fluidity (remember Heraclitus): it seems that there is something definite, but it immediately disappears. In this regard, the skeptic points to time itself, it is, but it is not there, it is impossible to "grab" it. sustainable meaning is absent altogether, everything is fluid, so live as you wish, take life in its immediate givenness. He who knows a lot cannot adhere to strictly unambiguous opinions. A skeptic can neither be a judge nor a lawyer. The skeptic Carneades, sent to Rome to petition for the abolition of the tax, spoke before the public one day in favor of the tax, and the next day against the tax. It is better for the skeptical sage to be silent. His silence is the philosophical answer to the questions put to him. We list the main provisions of ancient skepticism:

1) the world is fluid, it has no meaning and clear definition;

2) every affirmation is at the same time a negation, every "yes" is at the same time a "no"; the true philosophy of skepticism is silence;

3) follow the "world of phenomena", keep inner peace.

5. Neoplatonism

The main provisions of Neoplatonism were developed by Plotinus, who lived in Rome in adulthood. Below, when presenting the content of Neoplatonism, the ideas of Plotinus are mainly used.

Neoplatonists sought to give a philosophical picture of everything that exists, including the Cosmos as a whole. It is impossible to understand the life of a subject outside the Cosmos, just as the life of the Cosmos without a subject. Existing is arranged hierarchically: One - Good, Mind, Soul, Matter. The highest place in the hierarchy belongs to the One Good.

The soul produces all living beings. Everything that moves forms the Cosmos. Matter is the lowest form of existence. By itself, it is not active, inert, it is the recipient of possible forms and meaning.

The main task of a person is to think deeply, to feel his place in the structural hierarchy of being. Good (Good) comes from above, from the One, evil - from below, from matter. Evil is not a being, it has nothing to do with the Good. A person can avoid evil to the extent that he manages to climb the ladder of the immaterial: Soul-Mind-One. The Soul-Mind-United staircase corresponds to the sequence feeling - thought - ecstasy. Here, of course, attention is drawn to ecstasy, which stands above thought. But ecstasy, it should be noted, includes all the richness of the mental and sensual.

Neoplatonists see harmony and beauty everywhere, and the One Good is actually responsible for them. As for the life of people, it also, in principle, cannot contradict universal harmony. People are actors, they only carry out, each in their own way, the scenario that is laid down in the World Mind. Neoplatonism was able to give a rather synthetic philosophical picture of its contemporary ancient society. This was the last flowering of ancient philosophy.

Conclusion

The field of problematic issues in the philosophy of antiquity was constantly expanding. Their development has become more and more detailed and in-depth. It can be concluded that character traits ancient philosophy are as follows.

1. Ancient philosophy is syncretic, which means that it is characterized by greater fusion, inseparability of the most important problems than for subsequent types of philosophizing. The ancient philosopher, as a rule, extended ethical categories to the entire Cosmos.

2. Ancient philosophy is cosmocentric: its horizons always embrace the entire Cosmos, including the human world. This means that it was the ancient philosophers who developed the most universal categories.

3. Ancient philosophy proceeds from the Cosmos, sensual and intelligible. Unlike medieval philosophy, it does not prioritize the idea of ​​God. However, the Cosmos in ancient philosophy is often considered an absolute deity (not a person); this means that ancient philosophy is pantheistic.

4. Ancient philosophy achieved a lot at the conceptual level - the concept of Plato's ideas, the concept of form (eidos) of Aristotle, the concept of the meaning of the word (lecton) among the Stoics. However, she hardly knows the laws. The logic of antiquity is predominantly the logic of common names and concepts. However, in the logic of Aristotle, the logic of sentences is also considered very meaningfully, but again at the level characteristic of the era of antiquity.

5. The ethics of antiquity is primarily the ethics of virtues, and not the ethics of duty and values. Ancient philosophers characterized man mainly as endowed with virtues and vices. In developing the ethics of the virtues, they reached extraordinary heights.

6. Attention is drawn to the amazing ability of ancient philosophers to find answers to the cardinal questions of being. Ancient philosophy is truly functional, it is designed to help people in their lives. Ancient philosophers sought to find the path to happiness for their contemporaries. Ancient philosophy has not sunk into history, it has retained its significance to this day and is waiting for new researchers.

List of used literature.

1. Aristotle. Works in four volumes. Volume 1-4. USSR Academy of Sciences. Institute of Philosophy. Publishing house "Thought", Moscow, 1976-1984.

2. V.A. Kanke. Philosophy. Historical and systematic course. "Logos", M., 2001.

3. Plato. Theaetetus. State socio-economic publishing house. Moscow-Leningrad, 1936.

4. Plato. Feast. Publishing house "Thought", Moscow, 1975.

5. V. Asmus. Plato. Publishing house "Thought", Moscow, 1975.

6. T. Goncharova. Euripides. Series "Life wonderful people". Publishing house "Young Guard", M., 1984.

7. Life of wonderful people. Biographical library of F. Pavlenkov. "Lio Editor", St. Petersburg 1995.

8. History of philosophy. Tutorial for universities, edited by V.M. Mapelman and E.M. Penkov. PRIOR publishing house Moscow 1997.

9. Soviet encyclopedic Dictionary. Chief Editor A.M. Prokhorov. Fourth edition. "Soviet encyclopedia". M., 1989.

10. Philosophical dictionary. Edited by I.T. Frolov. Fifth edition. Moscow, Publishing house of political literature, 1987.

The main problems of ancient philosophy were:

The problem of being and non-being, matter and its forms. Ideas were put forward about the fundamental opposition of form and "matter", about the main elements, the elements of the cosmos; identity and opposition of being and non-being; structure of being; the fluidity of being and its inconsistency. The main problem here is how did the cosmos come about? What is its structure? (Thales, Anaximenes, Zeno, Anaximander, Democritus);

The problem of man, his knowledge, his relationship with other people. What is the essence of human morality, are there moral norms that do not depend on circumstances? What is politics and the state in relation to a person? How do rational and irrational correlate in human consciousness? Is there an absolute truth and is it achievable by the human mind? These questions were given different, often opposite, answers. (Socrates, Epicurus...);

The problem of will and freedom of man. Ideas were put forward of the insignificance of man before the forces of nature and social cataclysms and, at the same time, his power and strength of his spirit in the pursuit of freedom, noble thought, knowledge, in which they saw the happiness of man (Aurelius, Epicurus ...);

The problem of the relationship between man and God, divine will. The ideas of a constructive cosmos and being, the structure of the matter of the soul, society were put forward as interdependent.

The problem of the synthesis of the sensual and the supersensible; the problem of finding a rational method of cognition of the world of ideas and the world of things.(Plato, Aristotle and their followers...).

Characteristic features of ancient philosophy.

Ancient philosophy arises and develops to a large extent as a result of direct sensual contemplation peace. It was on the basis of direct sensory data that the argumentation of the world was built. A certain naivety of the ancient Greek conception of the world is connected with this.

The syncretism of ancient philosophy is the original indivisibility of knowledge. It included all the varieties of elements of emerging knowledge (geometric, aesthetic, music, crafts). This is largely due to the fact that the ancient Greek thinkers were diversified, engaged in various cognitive activities.

Ancient philosophy arose as a doctrine of nature, space (naturalistic philosophy). Later, from the middle of the 5th century (Socrates), the doctrine of man arises from that moment on two closely related lines: 1. Comprehension of nature, 2. Comprehension of man.

In ancient philosophy, a special approach is formed in the comprehension of nature and man (worldview). Cosmocentrism, the essence lies in the fact that the starting point in the development of philosophical problems was the definition of understanding the cosmos of nature as a single commensurate whole with some spiritual principle (soul, world mind). The law of the development of space as a source of development. Understanding the cosmos is at the center of understanding the world.

In accordance with the understanding of the cosmos, human nature is also understood. Man is a microcosm, in accordance with this, the relationship between man and the surrounding world (the harmony of man, the world, the mind of man, thinking) is understood.

As an important type of human activity, the mental, cognitive activity associated with the comprehension of both space and man, aimed at achieving the inner harmony of man, social harmony, harmony between man and space, was recognized.

This is connected with such a characteristic feature of philosophy and ancient culture as cognitive and ethical rationalism: Good is the result of knowledge, Evil is the result of not knowledge.

That is why the ideal of man in ancient philosophy is a sage who contemplates the world thinking about the world around.

1. The main question is the question of the essence of the cosmos, nature as an integral unified world, the universe. The cosmos was presented as a finite living being, harmoniously calculated, hierarchically arranged, spiritualized. The cosmos is arranged according to the principle of unity and forms such a structure where everything resides in everything, where each element serves as a representation and reflection of the whole and restores this whole in itself in its entirety, where each part is also everything, not mixed and inseparable from the whole. Every person, thing, event has its own meaning. The harmony of the cosmos manifests itself at all levels of the hierarchy, so that man is a microcosm.

2. The problem of being and becoming is based on the empirically observed difference between the stable and the changeable. That which is always unchanging is being, being, and that which is changeable is becoming. Being absolutely is, i.e. exists before all its possible divisions; it is whole, simple and one. It is perfect, immutable, has no other being as its beginning, is necessary, i.e. cannot but be, already become and identical.

3. Understanding the cosmos and being is based on expediency. If something happens, then there must be a reason that generates it - a goal. “The beginning of a thing,” says Aristotle, “is that for which it exists. And becoming is for the sake of the goal. If there is a goal, there is also a meaning - “for the sake of what”. For many ancient thinkers, what everything strives for is the Good as the first and last goal of the cause of existence.

4. Putting unity above multiplicity, ancient philosophers identified unity and wholeness. The whole was primarily understood as the indivisible. Among the representatives of the Milesian school, these are various varieties of the beginning (water, air, apeiron), with Heraclitus - fire, among the atomists - the atom. For Plato and Aristotle, these are eidoses, forms, ideal existential essences.

5. Ancient philosophers were basically epistemological optimists, considering it possible to know the world. They considered reason to be the main means of knowledge. They are characterized by recognition in accordance with the principle of hierarchy and hierarchically dissected structure of cognitive abilities, which depend on the parts of the human soul.

6. The problem of man is the clarification of the essence of man, his connection with the cosmos, his moral predestination, rationality and self-worth.

7. The problem of soul and body as a kind of problem of the correlation between the material and the ideal. The soul is understood either as independent of the material and predetermined by supernatural forces, immortal (Plato), or as a kind of material (the fiery atoms of Democritus). Universal animation (hylozoism) is recognized by Democritus and Aristotle.

8. Ethical problems in which a person appears as a being with base passions and desires and at the same time virtuous, endowed with the highest virtues. Within the framework of antiquity, he identifies several ethical areas:

- eudomonism- harmony between virtue and the pursuit of happiness (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle),

- hedonism- virtue is intertwined with pleasure, vice with suffering (Democritus, Epicurus),

- asceticism- self-restraint as a means of achieving moral superior qualities(cynics, stoics).

9. Ethical issues are closely intertwined with political issues. The individual and the citizen are considered as identical, therefore the problems of the state are ethical problems and vice versa.

10. The problem of the genesis, nature and systematization of scientific knowledge, an attempt to identify sections of philosophical knowledge (Aristotle).

11. A certain classification of sciences based on the cognitive abilities of a person or determined by the degree of significance of the object of study.

12. Development of ways to achieve truth in a dispute, i.e. dialectics as a method of thinking (Socrates, Zeno of Elea).

13. The discovery and subsequent development of a kind of objective dialectics, stating the fluidity, variability, inconsistency of the material world (Miletian school, Heraclitus).

14. The problem of the beautiful, reflected in art, is recognized as either illusory (a copy of a copy according to Plato cannot be beautiful), or capable of freeing a person from power from feelings and giving scope to a reasonable beginning in a person (Aristotle’s catharsis).