Ancient Science

Ancient Explanations of the Universe

One of the questions that early philosopher's sought to answer was, what is the essential nature or composition of the universe? A secondary, but connected question was around "the One and the Many". This question revolved around how things maintained their unity and identity, while having disparate physical ingredients or qualities. One of the first theorists on these issues was Thales of Miletus.

Thales argued that on an essential level, everything was water. Water was an essential aspect of all life, could be extracted from all life, and emerged from even the driest objects or settings with enough pressure or effort.

Anaximander

Greek philosopher b. ~610 BCE postulated an early form of evolution where life emerged from "moist earth" by evaporation, and that humanity was descended from a sort of fish requiring long development and change

Pythagoras

Greek philosopher ~ b. 570 BCE who postulated that there were 3 different principles which were present in the world.

The Monad represented the unity and connectedness of reality, The Dyad represented differentiation and diversity and amid both of these was Harmony which united the universe through geometrical shapes, tones, numbers and language. The principle underlying this harmony was the Logos

The Logos

Heraclitus

Greek philosopher b. ~ 535 BCE. Postulated that the entire world had at its elemental level a kind of "fire" which made everything, the variations in physical qualities being accounted for by the degree to which the fire was quenched or heated.

Also argued that physical observations were preferable, but were meaningless if done so with a "barbarian soul"

Heraclitus added to the concept of the Logos. "You cannot step into the same river twice" While physical reality shifts around us, we perceptually give it constancy and logically and rationally impose order onto reality.

By do so we participate in the divine principle of the Logos, giving shape to the universe

Democritus

Greek philosopher b. ~460 BCE postulated that all of the world was built out of tiny invisible blocks (atoms) that when combined and arranged in different arrangements constituted the differences that we see in the world.

On one hand, Democritus also needed to articulate a counter particle called "void". The universe consisted of both "atoms" and "void", which filled the gaps creating reality, but also creating space for the movement and motion of atoms from which all life, motion, reality and diversity emerged.

Anaxagoras: Nothing but Meat... and Mind

Anaxagoras b. ~500 BCE was sentenced to death for impiety, but avoided the sentence by being exiled from Athens. He postulated that the sun was a burning rock, and that all things contained the core ingredients of each other - surmising this by noting that animals grew bones, flesh, wool from the food that they consumed.

He argued that a chaotic mess of physical reality was all that existed - with no "soul" or spiritual reality per se, other than "Nous" or Mind which gave shape and form and purpose to the reality around it. Anaxagoras argued that Nous was the initiating and determining principle in shaping all of reality.

This idea of Nous was deeply influential shaping philosophical thought in his aftermath. (https://iep.utm.edu/anaxagor/)

Plato / Aristotle: The Realm of Ideas

Both Plato and Aristotle placed more emphasis on the underlying logical principles of reality (math, geometry, values and morality) and argued that all of reality were shadows to these "pure" principles with varying degrees of their accuracy and expression in the muddy reality of physical reality.

Plato thought science and experimentation were necessary means of discovering or "remembering" these principles or "ideas" which ultimately informed all of reality in one unity. "Ideas" were real things which underlay our reality.

Aristotle adapted Plato's views, taking some but applying them much more specifically to the material world around him. As such each individual thing, might itself have an informing "ideal". Further he agreed that there were some fundamental building blocks to physical reality arguing that they were 'earth, air, fire, water', that when rearranged or mixed in proportion could account for the diversity of physical reality.

Archimedes

buoyancy, light angles and refraction,

Was shanked by a Roman soldier after trying to prevent the Roman conquest and developing hella super death weapons to stop them.

Ptolemy

planets and movement

slaying heart with his pretty boy routine, living on an Egyptian beach and measuring the size of beach balls.

Galen

four core ingredient to humans

Blood, Bile, Phlegm and Puss

But what is the difference between Metaphysics and Physics? Science and Philosophy?

For early thinkers, there was little distinction; the line we draw between the physical sciences, the mathematical, and more amorphous branches of linguistic and ideas were deeply connected and their separation seemingly arbitrary. the exploration of the "physical world" naturally lead into the field of "Meta-physical world"

METAPHYSICS

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